Sun and Moon and Stars
by butterflydarlin
Summary: Daenerys and Doreah, locking eyes across rooms.
1. one

Standard disclaimers.

She matters always.

She thinks that she doesn't. She was granted freedom alongside the rest, she knows it, but she has never lived her life untethered. She does not think of herself as a slave, but she thinks of herself as _belonging to_. It is her place to serve.

It is her place to serve _you_.

You've always thought of her as special, but you're not sure that she grasps it. You treasure all of your maids, all of your people, but she is something altogether different. Something you have never been able to articulate fully. You loved your khal in time, loved him with all of your heart, but this is somehow different. There is a glint in her eyes that you never found in his, even in his most loving moments. There is a trust so implicit.

She has been through hell, before you and for you, and you know in ways you cannot say that it is not just because she _belongs to_. Not for you.

She thinks she knows what her place is, what her role is. She is forever to your side, forever behind; you know that she looks at whoever she feels she must from under her eyelashes, smiling a slow smile, she twists her hands and lets them imagine. She does not let them try it on, not since –

Everything she does now, even if she does it for you, is because she _wants to_. Nothing more.

She has told you as much as the first, that her life is yours. You always tell her no, her life is hers, but she just shakes her head. Given to her by you, pledged to you by her own choosing. Faithful.

You can't help but search for her eyes across the courtyard, shining like dark stars in this endless night sky of strangers. You have a job to do, you have a part to play, and you are not _distracted_, but she is helping in her way. Just being, she is helping.

She always helps, even when she does not mean to.

Sometimes you think back to what you had that first time; it was playacting, you thought, it was simply a naïve girl being taught lessons by one more experienced. But you have seen it mirrored since then, more times than you perhaps knew when you look back. A glint of joy, of pride, of something that is only for you. She has never flashed such a look at those she lets imagine.

You wish you knew how to say this to her, to arrange her once and for all as starlight in your darkness. She has helped you to climb from the worst of it; she has whispered to you when you cannot sleep and whispered to your children to praise their growing. You loved your husband with all your heart in time, but you think perhaps you have always loved her a bit, too.

First love can sting. It cannot always be seen so clearly. You could not have known what to look for, you could not have known how it would latch to you and the realization would sneak up. You cannot say it, but you hope that it plays out in your eyes when they meet hers.


	2. two

Standard disclaimers.

She stands out always.

Amongst the people she was given to and then swore to look after, she is the sun, she is white-hot fire. Amongst these people who perhaps resemble the society she should have grown up in, she is the moon, patient and radiant, true inside their lies. You have learned their myths, the sun-husband and moon-wife, but she transcends that. She is her own wife, master of her own desires, so wholly self-possessed and self-containing.

Even in the great cities, her straw-colored hair catches eyes, like rays of sun's and moon's light entwined down her back. She steps like a dancer (you know she's never had so much as a minute of instruction) and holds her head high as if she's already wearing the crown she desires (it's easy to imagine).

These strangers bustle her about, all of them admiring (how couldn't they be) and eager to entertain the shiny new thing. A plaything: you hope that's not what they see in her, and maybe you're just wary (knowing from experience, protective of your khaleesi) but you suppose that it is.

You do your job as she is doing hers: you let them entertain you, you fix on your practiced smile. It's the one you've developed over years and years, the one that nobody else can tell is false. You don't fuss with these clothes they've brought for you (hardly as fine as hers, but then, it doesn't matter, not really) but you let the men who speak to you imagine them being torn off as they please.

When you glance across the room, you think you see the same smile across her lips: she so rarely gives a smile that's true. You think of the true one now as her dragon-smile, the one that's reserved for her children, sometimes witnessed by you. It's in her eyes.

She's playing her part well, none of these strangers seem to suspect she's anything less than ecstatic. She is gracious, certainly, she is flattered and hopeful. But even many of her people never see the dragon-smile. There is no need. She is truer than anyone, but she keeps many things to herself.

You have learned this about her: her grief and her joy alike remain largely private. You have seen her so beautiful, so pale and bare time and time again, but you can count the times you have seen tears in her eyes on one hand. She doesn't feel it her place to burden others with such things.

She is flashing that not-quite-real smile at these strangers, wearing their dresses, drinking their wines; she is telling them stories, over and over at their insistence, she is widening her eyes as she listens to them (her eyes like jewels you could barely dream of) and laughing appreciatively.

When you look again (you've been casting glances sideways as the men talk to you all this time, playing with the rings on your fingers) she catches your eye. You twist your lips upward – might as well look as if you meant to offer some encouragement, not as if you were spying from across the way – even as you keep speaking to the men, and as the couple who have cornered her continue to go on at length, she matches it, lowering her gaze _just enough_ but never breaking.

You know the smirk on her face, and it's better than the dragon-smile. You dare to think it may be one just for you.


End file.
